Lacrimosa — “Testimonium” (2017)

I was very surprised when suddenly found this new Lacrimosa album in my news feed. Actually, I’m not that huge Lacrimosa fan, although I’m listening to their old works pretty often. I’ve never followed any of their feeds and wasn’t even interested in their local live shows. But every time I find something new from Lacrimosa, I watch it and listen to it with patience. So I listened to “Testimonium” and wrote this short review based on my own emotions as any other of my reviews.

Testimonium

“Testimonium” is so… metal? My Lord, why. Every next release is more and more gothic-metal oriented, and I think that I’ll never be able to listen to another mixed masterpiece such as “Echoes”. Why metal? Why screams and blast-beats?

I read somewhere that Lacrimosa is not only about darkwave, gothic and metal. This band is always metamorphosing into something new. It grows and its evolution is similar to its members’ evolution. I’m not surprised that Tilo Wolff decided to take the metal path, but I still hope to listen to stuff similar to their old songs too.

Tracklist

Wenn unsere Helden sterben

Nach dem Sturm

Zwischen allen Stühlen

Weltenbrand

Lass die Nacht nicht über mich fallen

Herz und Verstand

Black Wedding Day

My Pain

Der leise Tod

Testimonium

Pros

Atmosphere. Tilo Wolff is the master of dark atmosphere. Even if the band has turned into this, it’s still interesting to listen to “Testimonium” from this position.

Cons

Metal. This metal is bad and boring. If we tore “Testimonium” apart and look at its metal theme separately from atmosphere — it’s really bad and predictable. I wasn’t able to find any memorable song I wanted to listen to again and again.

Overal

I don’t know what to say. On one hand, “Testimonium” is very gothic, symphonic and so on. It’s a good follower of previous releases, perfectly mastered and mixed. On the other hand, it’s an example of boring yet hard gothic metal you barely want to listen to again.